The Crossing Community Church
“Rest For The Stressed”
Pastor Jim Botts
August 11th, 2002
Introduction
We live in a very tense, uptight and fast paced world filled with hurry...
A Tahoma, Washington newspaper carried the story of Tattoo the basset hound a while back. Tattoo didn’t intend to go for an evening run, but when his owner shut the dog’s leash in the car door and took off for a drive – with Tattoo still outside the vehicle, he had no choice. Motorcycle officer Terry Filbert notice a passing vehicle with something dragging behind it. He commented that the poor basset hound was, “picking them up and putting them down as fast as he could.” He chased the car to a stop, and Tattoo was rescued. But not before the dog had reached a top speed of 25 miles per hour, falling down and rolling over several times.
Too many of us are living our lives like Tattoo, picking them up and putting them down as fast as we can – rolling around & feeling dragged through life.
Time magazine noted that back in the 60’s, expert testimony was given to a Senate sub-committee on time management. They predicted that advances in technology would radically change how many hours a week people worked. They forecasted that the average American would be working 22 hours a week within 20 years. “The great challenge,” the experts said, “would be figuring out what to do with all the excess time.” Over 40 years later, after major advances in technology – how many of us are wondering what to do with all the excess time on our hands?
Our world has become the world of the Red Queen of Alice and Wonderland: “Now here, you see, it takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that.”
How many of us feel like that? Let’s take a group quiz to see how many of us are being dragged through life. Fill in the blanks:
I’m ready to throw in the…
I’m at the end of my…
I’m just a bundle of…
My life is falling…
I’m at my wit’s…
I feel like resigning from the human…
Apparently we’re all experiencing the rat race. Just when you thought you were getting ahead, along come faster rats. But remember, he who wins the rat race is still a rat.
We need to learn how to experience rest. If all we needed was physical rest we can always take a nap. If we needed only emotional rest, we can always take a vacation. But where can we find spiritual rest? How can we obtain relief regarding the deepest issues of life at the deepest level of our hearts.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
Jesus spoke to this very issue 2000 years ago in Matthew 11:28-30
**Read Matthew 11:28-30 NKJV**
This passage contains 3 commands from Jesus that lead to rest.
I will experience rest for my soul as I obey Jesus’ command of…
1. COME TO ME “Come…all…and I will give…”
Jesus regularly invited people to come to Him to meet their needs.
NOTICE: What Jesus did NOT say, “Come to church to find rest”
Christianity begins with meeting Christ personally.
Going to McDonalds does not make you a hamburger. Going into a garage doesn’t make you a car. Going to church does not make you a Christian (you must meet Christ personally).
Gathering information about Jesus does not make you a Christian. Joining a group does not make you a Christian. Having Christian parents doesn’t make you a Christian.
You become a Christian through a moment of time choice to answer His invitation to turn from your own ways and come to Him. You will find that He’s been waiting for you all along. Have you done that? Can you look to a time when you decided to answer His call to come
You say, “but my life is really a mess, I don’t think I am ready to come." HIS INVITATION: Come one, come all, come as you are!
**If you’re hungry: Did you realize that you have a hungry soul?
John 6:35 Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst” (NASB).
**If you’re thirsty: He will satisfy our soul’s thirst if we come.
John 7:37-38 Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ’From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.”
**If you want eternal life: We can come to Him for eternal life.
John 5:39-40 "You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that bear witness of Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life’ (NASB).
The search to satisfy these needs on our own leads down many empty roads. The tiresome search for of the soul, coming up empty is what Jesus is speaking to. He has a gift to give!!!
SPIRITUAL REST TO BE GIVEN: “Come to me & I will give you rest”
1. Rest for those who labor: (gr. Labor to the point of exhaustion, toil) SELF EFFORT
He is not speaking to the working class laborer, but to sincere, conscientious people who are trying to balance the scales of good deeds vs. bad deeds to be accepted by God. You never know how you account is balanced at any time.
Human effort falls far short of the standard God requires. The cross is the place of exchange where what I am is placed on Him and what He is, is given to me. My bad deeds are removed and placed on Him. I rest on His perfect deeds credited to my account.
2. Rest for those who are heavy laden: (gr. To load up, overburden) BURDENED
These stagger under the heavy weight and burden of sin.
Living for yourself, for possessions, prominence and pleasure is a burden.
Nicolas Cage: “I wonder if there is a hole in the soul of my generation. We’ve inherited the American dream, but where do we take it?”
Harrison Ford: The actor whose movies have grossed over 2 billion dollars said, “you only want what you ain’t got.” What ain’t he got? “Peace!” was his answer!
In Jesus Christ the full penalty has already been paid. You can begin life anew and have the page wiped clean. God did not send Jesus to rub our sins in, but to rub them out. He bore the guilt and paid the penalty, there is nothing left to pay. Come and rest in what Jesus has done for you.
The sense of relief of burden is real for all who’ve come to Christ. The Bible calls it “peace with God.” You ca come to Him right now, by faith!
I will experience rest for my soul as I also obey Jesus’ command of…
2. TAKE MY YOKE (upon you)
YOKE: “a type of harness that connects a pair of oxen.”
A pair of connected oxen was typically called a yoke of oxen.
Used metaphorically to refer to submission to a teacher
In NT times the phrase, “to take the yoke of” was used by rabbi’s to refer to “becoming a submitted pupil of a teacher”
Used 6x in the NT, the word has two dominant figurative ideas.
1. The yoke of rules and religion. MANS YOKE
Acts 15:7-11 spells out the yoke of following rules and religious system to be accepted by God. This is the way most people are familiar with the idea of relating to God – through rules and religion. This is not the “my yoke” that Jesus speaks of.
2. The yoke of relationship. JESUS YOKE
Jesus said that His yoke is easy “well fitted.” It fits the need.
Rules and religion don’t fit the need for personal relationship.
His yoke is easy compared to man made religious yokes.
His burden is light compared to the burden of human effort.
Jesus’ sign outside his carpenter shop, “My yokes fit well!”
JESUS SAID "MY YOKE:" Jesus commands we take up HIS yoke to find rest
There is no rest in rules and religion, but only in a personal relationship with God based on the finished work of Jesus.
Which yoke have you been under? Jesus’ or man’s? We access all that God has for us through our choices.
Yoke Pictures Three Things:
1. Connection “Be with Me.” Yokes are made for two, not one. We were not meant to go through life living apart from God. His yoke fits well and is lighter than the one we’ve been pulling by ourselves. Be connected to Jesus!
2. Direction “Follow Me.” The idea of a yoke pictures the forward motion of two connected together. You cannot be yoked to Jesus and go your own way anymore. We follow Him and His direction for our life. Follow Jesus!
3. Cooperation “Work with Me.” To be yoked together means that we cooperate with His work. Before we come to Him, we were living for this side of eternity. Now we are joined to His work and discover that our lives make an eternal impact.
We experience only when we obey: COME and TAKE His yoke.
Rest is the result of obedience! We rest in Him!
J.H. Jowett summarized the thought this way…
The fatal mistake for the believer is to seek to bear life’s load in a single collar. God never intended man to carry his burden alone. Christ therefore deals only in yokes! A yoke is a neck harness for two, and the Lord Himself pleads to be One of the two. He wants to share the labor of any galling task. The secret of peace and victory in the Christian life is found in putting off the taxing collar of “self” and accepting the Master’s relaxing “yoke.”
I will experience rest for my soul as I also obey Jesus’ command of…
3. LEARN FROM ME
His third command is to learn from Him (are you open to learn?)
All of us are ignorant, just on different subjects
We come, take up His yoke, the process of learning begins.
**Gentleness: Strength under control (Jesus as the example).
Religious people can be cold and harsh, but no so Jesus. His gentleness draws us to Him with our cares and concerns. Wouldn’t it be great to have someone you can pour out your deepest thoughts, a gentle person who has the strength to help. We need to learn that He wants love on us.
1 Peter 5:7 Give all your worries to him, because he cares about you (NCV).
**Humility: Selflessness (Jesus as the example)
Again, religious people can be arrogant and rude toward us.
Pride and self-centeredness is descriptive of the Devil. The very things that turn people off from the church are the very opposite of what Jesus is really like. Hurting, lost and weary people were drawn to Jesus because He cared for them and met their needs.
THE REST HE GIVES (FREE GIFT): Once and for all we rest in His work on the cross for us to make us acceptable to God (real relief for the labor and burden of our lives apart from God).
THE REST WE FIND (DISCOVERY): There is no need to fear what Jesus might do in your life. He is gentle and humble. The more you learn that about Him, the more you will find your rest in Him.
One day a man went by to see a farmer who was plowing his field with a team of oxen. The man noticed that one of the animals was seemingly a little bigger than the other so he asked him about it. The response from the farmer was very interesting. He said that the big animal was an older animal that was well trained and the smaller one was a young animal that was new to the yoke. The man went on to inquire as to why he put them together and this is the answer that He got,
“Well you see, it’s like this. That older ox is the best ox that I have ever had; he knows his way around the field. The reason I put the younger one with him is so the older, more knowledgeable ox could teach him how to plow. If I never put them together the younger one would never learn. By himself the younger ox would pull himself to death, but together he learns to cooperate with and rest in the strength of the older ox.”
Does your life feel like the ox whose pulling himself to death. Rest comes from obedience to Jesus’ commands. COME to Me, TAKE My yoke upon you, LEARN from Me.
Hebrews 4: 11 So we must make every effort to enter that place of rest. Then no one will be lost by following the example of those who refused to obey. (GWT).
